It’s been said that to beat the index, you can’t be the
index. This is the overriding philosophy of Vancouver-based Steadyhand, with their
“un-dexing” approach to investing. And as a result, Steadyhand funds tend
to be concentrated, with offerings that look nothing like their benchmarks.
The
Steadyhand Equity Fund
is their North American equity offering, and is managed by Gord O’Reilly of Toronto based
CGOV Asset Management, which joined up with Fiera Capital
this past May. The fund’s outperformance has garnered it the monthly
FundGrade A grade, as well as multiple annual FundGrade A+ Awards.

RBC Global High Yield Bond Fund
has an interesting mandate with a target mix that is split between
high-yield bonds and emerging market debt. At the end of December, managers
Jane Lesslie
and
Frank Gambino
had the portfolio at roughly their target mix, with 52% invested in
emerging market bonds and 45% in high-yield debt. They had taken some
profits off the table in the high-yield space, and had added to the
emerging markets exposure after the U.S. election. The fund’s strategy has
produced some stellar results, especially in 2016, when it won the
Fundata FundGrade A+™ Award
for the second time.

Dividends have been shown to be a key contributor to the long-term returns
of equity funds, and the
BMO Monthly High Income Fund II
is one of the stronger Canadian dividend fund offerings out there. Managed
by the team of
Kevin Hall
and
Michelle Robitaille, it invests mainly in high-yielding common equities and real estate
investment trusts (REITs).

In Canada, it has been shown that over time, roughly 65% to 70% of the
total return of equities comes from reinvested dividends. That makes for a
very compelling case to have dividend stocks a key part of your portfolio.
With that in mind, I reviewed a number high-quality, dividend-focused
exchange-traded funds (ETFs). The FundGrade A-Grade-rated
PowerShares Canadian Dividend ETF (TSX: PDC)
stood out as pretty attractive relative to its peers.

Leith Wheeler
is one of those companies you don’t hear a lot about. Since 1982, this
employee owned shop has quietly gone about its business of managing money
for a wide range of Canadian retail, private client, and institutional
investors. And one of its top performers is the
Leith Wheeler Canadian Dividend Fund.

Today, the Fidelity Income Allocation Fund is a tactically-focused fund that invests in a mix of fixed-income asset classes and income-oriented equities. Before July 2010, it was a dramatically different offering, known as the Fidelity Monthly High Income Fund, which invested primarily in income trusts. The downside is that this makes it difficult to get a sense of the longer term performance of the fund, because anything before 2010 is not applicable.

With a modest MER and an experienced management team at the helm, GBC Canadian Bond Fund has been one of the strongest performers over the past five years. For the five years ending September 30, it gained 5.3%, handily outpacing the FTSE TMX Canada Universe Bond Index (formerly DEX Universe Bond Index) and the majority of its peers.

Although theMawer Global Small Cap Fund debuted only in 2007, it has more than held its own, both when compared with the MSCI World Small Cap Index and its peer group. For the five years ending September 30, it has earned an annualized return of 19.5%, handily outpacing both the index and its peer group. As impressive as the returns have been, the results from Mawer’s emphasis on risk management have been even more so. The fund has a level of volatility that is lower than its peer group, while holding up very well when markets are in decline.

TheRBC North American Value Fund has proven to be a strong performer over the longer term, despite its $2.1 billion large-cap asset base. That’s mainly because the team of Stuart Kedwell and Doug Raymond manage the fund using a multi-stage portfolio construction process that incorporates both quantitative screening and fundamental, bottom-up analysis with overall portfolio allocation deriving from the rigorous stock selection process rather than an attempt to predict macroeconomic trends.

The Dynamic Strategic Yield Fund is a relatively new balanced fund that is managed by Dynamic's team of Oscar Belaiche and Michael McHugh. It invests in a mix of stocks and bonds with the objective of generating a total return that is a mix of yield and long-term capital growth. It pays investors a monthly distribution of $0.0584 a unit, which works out to an annualized yield of about 4.6%.

The Beutel Goodman American Equity Fund continues its winning ways with index-beating performance and below-average volatility. The fund’s consistent value approach has made it regular top-quartile performer in annualized returns, contributing to its Fundata FundGrade® A-Grade standing again in July, as well as its award of the FundGrade A+ Rating for 2013. A year-to-date gain of 10.8% to July 31 put it among the top-10 performers in the U.S. Equity category.

The managers at Trimark Canadian Opportunity Class use the famously disciplined Trimark approach with a bottom-up, fundamentally-driven stock selection process. That’s paid off for this 13-year-old fund, which posted a benchmark-beating first-quartile 5-year average return of 11.6% as of July 31. Can they keep the momentum?

Unlike a lot of small-cap funds that look to shoot the lights out with big returns and big volatility, theDynamic Small Business Fund takes a more conservative approach. Managed by the team of Oscar Belaiche and Jason Gibbs using what they call “quality at a reasonable price” approach, the fund has nevertheless delivered a compound average annual 10-year return of 13.82%.

The GBC Growth and Income Fund proves that good things come in small packages. With just a little over $66 million in assets under management, this offering from Pembroke Private Wealth Management has managed itself into first-quartile performance over the past seven years, handily outperforming its peers in the Canadian Equity Balanced category, and earning it the Fundata FundGrade® A-Grade for June as well as two consecutive Fundata FundGrade A+ Ratings, in 2011 and again 2012.

With worries over the European economic situation lessening, European equities have been on a pretty strong run of late, with the Chou Europe Fund leading the European Equity mutual fund pack. It was one of the top performers over the five years ending June 30, gaining an average of 16.3% per year. For the past year alone, it gained an impressive 27%. The fund kept its Fundata FundGrade® A-Grade for June, and achieved the Fundata FundGrade A Rating™ in 2013.

After taking a beating in 2007 and 2008, theBrandes Canadian Equity Fund has really bounced back sharply, gaining an annualized 21.2% for the five years ending June 30, handily outpacing the index and the majority of the other Canadian equity funds in the country, placing it in the Number 1 spot in the Canadian Focused Equity category and earning it a Fundata FundGrade® A Grade for June.

Despite a rough start in 2011, the performance of CIBC U.S. Small Companies Fund has definitely improved since the new management team led by David A. Daglio at The Boston Company Asset Management took over the fund in August 2010. For the three years ending May 31, the fund gained 15.3%, finishing in the top quartile. Volatility has been higher than both the benchmark and the average of other U.S. small-cap funds.

Finally, a fund after my own heart – entertainment and communications! The TD Entertainment & Communications Fund invests in companies that are involved in the entertainment, media, and communications industries, such as Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN), Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG), and Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB). Given the pace at which our communication technologies continue to evolve, there is significant growth opportunity if you have the stomach to withstand the potential of another tech bubble.

If you don’t already own units of this great fund, then you are out of luck. It has been capped since November 2011, and there has been no discussion of reopening it anytime soon. One of the differentiating factors of this high-yield fund is that it focuses on higher quality issues in the high-yield space, mainly on medium-quality corporate bonds, convertibles, and preferreds. At the end of March, 91% of its holdings were rated BB or lower.

The Sentry Small/Mid Cap Income Fund has long been one of my favourite small- and mid-cap offerings available. Managed by the Sentry Investments team of Aubrey Hearn and Michael Simpson, it has the dual objective of providing both consistent monthly income and capital growth. And so far, the fund has delivered on its promise. Hence the consistent Fundata FundGrade “A” ratings.

Sentry considers this fund to be a feeder fund to its highly successfulSentry Canadian Income Fund. It invests in the same type of companies, namely those with high returns on invested capital, modest cash flow expenditures, and the ability to generate free cash flow, which are trading at a valuation that is less than their true value. The big difference is the companies in this fund are just too small to be included in the large-cap focused Canadian Income Fund.